


Pale Hearted

by Cats_Dont_Float



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Abusive Kismesissitude, Abusive Relationships, Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, F/F, F/M, Gamzee Makara/Terezi Pyrope Kismesissitude, M/M, Minor Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, Minor Rose Lalonde/Kanaya Maryam, Pale Romance | Moirallegiance, Underage Drinking, Unhealthy Kismesissitude
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-23
Updated: 2020-02-23
Packaged: 2021-02-28 02:21:40
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,199
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22866268
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Cats_Dont_Float/pseuds/Cats_Dont_Float
Summary: Spurred on by pale instinct, Kanaya spends most of her time on the meteor looking after the others and making sure they're safe and healthy. She doesn't mind, though. She'd do anything for the idiots she loves.(tws in the tags)
Relationships: Dave Strider/Karkat Vantas, Gamzee Makara/Terezi Pyrope, Rose Lalonde/Kanaya Maryam
Kudos: 29





	Pale Hearted

You’d thought you’d hate this trip on the meteor, when it had first begun. After all, it’s cold, eerily quiet and, worst of all, dark almost all of the time. It’s the perfect habitat for your species, in theory, but you've always preferred the scorching heat of the day and the brightness of the world in sunlight. So being stuck inside on a dark rock like this for three years wasn’t exactly your idea of a good time, or a ‘fucking frat party’ as the Dave human calls it, a human figure of speech you don’t quite understand. But there’s just something about this meteor that brings out something in you, the worst in you, or possibly the best, depending on what part of society you listen to. Because your name is Kanaya Maryam, and you are realising just how undoubtedly pale you are for every single idiot on this rock.

It started, of course, with Karkat. The small mutant troll has always confided in you, always been close to you, and after he and Gamzee broke off their moirallegiance it seemed inevitable that the two of you would drift into a pale romance. But since then things have gotten weird, and it seems that the inhabitants on this meteor are all just too pitiful for you to deal with normally. Karkat is still your moirail, but neither of you have found any problem with the way that you seem to form pale bonds with the others too.

Your days are busy. Dave keeps track of time with his powers, which you’re thankful for, because without a strict schedule you’d never get everything done that you need to. There’s no day or night here, so you rise at the same time the humans do, even though you’ve found that with your rainbow drinker status comes an ability to function on far less sleep than before, and you start each day with an early breakfast before the others get to the small mealblock and destroy it. Then you fix another meal, the same every time: two slices of grubloaf with a small serving of grubsauce. This meal you take down one of the smaller corridors that have been blocked off. You’re the only one who goes there; no one else would want to make their way through a maze of corridors stained with blood and littered with debris from fights and murders that you’re all still trying to forget. But at the end of these corridors you find a small vent, a different one each time in case you get found out, and leave the plate of food by it. You might hate the clown’s guts for what he did, but you’d rather he not starve to death, if only so that you don’t have yet another body to clean up. And Karkat insists Gamzee be cared for, even if he isn’t brave enough to do it himself, and you know there’s nothing you wouldn’t do for Karkat.

With that taken care of you return to the main part of the meteor, where breakfast is now underway for the two humans and possibly Karkat if he’s awake yet (unlikely). You don’t have time for them yet, though you will inevitably find yourself seeking them out later. Instead you follow the faint scent of teal blood until you find wherever Gamzee has decided is a suitable place to ditch Terezi this morning. This time she’s splayed out on her back in an old dusty room, wearing her scalemate printed boxers and her FLARP cloak, and you crouch slowly beside her.

“This isn’t healthy,” you sigh softly, reaching to shake her awake. She shifts and you run a hand over her cheek gently as she stirs. Her face is sticky with faygo and there’s the usual bruising along her neck and collarbones. 

“Kan?” She murmurs tiredly, sitting up slowly, and you help her up, an arm going around her shoulders to support her.

“Terezi I -”

“I know,” she cuts you off. You give her the same lecture about healthy kismesissitude relationships every time. You’d continue your speech, but her face is crumpled in on itself and you know she is desperate to get away from you. She grabs a cane from her sylladex and gets up to her feet, kicking aside a broken horn and then an empty faygo bottle. 

“Terezi,” you call after her, wanting in some way to reach out and let her know she’s not alone. But she’s already gone, limping away to her room to cover up and attempt to treat the injuries Gamzee has left her with this time, injuries that are far more aggressive than even the most dedicated of kismesises would think acceptable. You don’t have time to dwell on it though; it’s time to check in on Karkat.

He is, predictably, not in the mealblock with the humans when you pass by, and doesn’t seem to have emerged from his respitblock yet. So you wander for a while until you reach his room, right at the end of a narrow, dark corridor, and let yourself in without knocking. He’s collapsed in the pile he’s made right in the middle of the room, curled up in a few of the softer items and hugging a copy of one of his favorite romcoms to his chest. He’s not asleep though; you see his ears twitch when you walk in.

“Karkat, time to get up,” you call, standing over him until he opens up his eyes and rolls his head sideways to look up at you grouchily. “Come on,” you say, a little sterner, “You need to eat.” And this time he moves a little more, into some sort of sitting position.

“Alright,” he grumbles, and when he finally gets to his feet he lets you pull him into a hug. His head slips onto your shoulder and he rumbles out a small purr when you smooth your hand over his hair a few times, careful not to hit his horns.

“I’ll meet you in the mealblock in a while,” you tell him, and then, satisfied with how easy that was, you slip out of his room again.

Rose is, unfortunately, not in the mealblock when you return there, but the other human, Dave is. He’s sat on the side instead of on the table for some reason, those headphones he always has on him over his ears, the muffled beat just about escaping from underneath them so you can hear it. He takes them off when you come in though, more of the noise getting out of them and filling the room, and the corner of his mouth twitches upwards into the vague reflection of a smile that seems to be the most he can manage.

“Mornin’, Kan,” he says. He calls you Kan. “Whatchu upta?” 

“Hello,” you reply, “I’m making breakfast for Karkat. What are you doing?” 

“Jamming to my newest sick beats,” he tells you.

You understand less than half of what he just said, but still you nod and say, “Right.”

He lets out a snort of laughter and hops off of the side. “You’re a riot, Kan, truly,” he tells you, doing what Rose says are called ‘finger guns’, “But I should get going.”

“Where to?” You ask.

“Nowhere,” he shrugs, and you sigh.

“To sit on the roof for hours and brood over things you won’t tell anyone about?” You guess.

“How do you know that?” He asks, face actually showing just a little bewilderment for once, and you laugh, because he has no idea just how much you know about everything that goes on on this meteor.

“Well, take this with you if you’re going up there,” you tell him, and chuck a plastic bottle full of water directly at his chest, “Wouldn’t want your human body shrivelling to nothing in the vacuum of space.”

He catches the bottle with surprisingly quick reflexes that seem almost unnatural for a human. “Thanks, Kan,” he says, and you hear him chuckling lowly to himself as he slinks away into the corridor.

“And just what the fuck is Strider so happy about?” Karkat grumbles, stomping into the mealblock. You laugh and pull him into a hug. Sometimes you are just so overwhelmed by how much you love these people.

You get a few hours to yourself after making sure Karkat eats breakfast, and you spend the time working on a new dress you’ve been creating. It’s a long piece, a ball gown of sorts, black and green, something you think your ancestor would have worn. It’s just for fun, really, you can’t ever see yourself wearing something like that, but the process of pinning and sewing each piece of fabric neatly into places soothes your mind. You even get a chance to sit down with a mug of your favourite rose tea (a human thing that Rose introduced you to) and a new rainbow drinker romance novel for a while.

Sometime into the afternoon Terezi trails miserably into your room, and you pull her into the pile you have at one side of the room for moments exactly like this. You cannot count the amount of times you’ve had one of the other inhabitants of this meteor come to for a feelings jam. You pull Terezi into the pile with you, apologising when a stray sewing needle catches her hand, though she laughs at it with her usual too-wide smile, all sharp teeth and head thrown back as she cackles. She cracks eventually though, facade slipping as she admits she’s feeling used by Gamzee, unappreciated. You give your usual advice, though you’re beginning to lose hope she’ll take it. You lightly suggest you bring your chainsaw back out again, but she denies your offer. Something in her eyes tells you she still cares for the clown, and she’s still holding onto a thread of hope that he feels the same. It makes you feel sick to your stomach, and you almost want to stop your daily routine of making sure he eats, though you know you never could. You are almost lusus like in your instinctive urge to keep everyone around you safe and healthy.

It is as it grows later in the day, though, that you finally allow yourself to do what you have been wanting to all day. You put down your needles and thread, and leave the room, seeking out the only resident of the meteor you haven’t seen to yet.

Rose likes a lot of time to herself, and you respect her for that. She, like Dave, has seen things beyond your comprehension, and you understand her need for some alone time to process everything. But you worry for her. You want her to be safe. She is, perhaps, the only one on this meteor who you feel anything slightly more than pale for, though you have yet to allow yourself to indulge in those feelings.

She is not hard to find. The faint scent of human alcohol lingers in the air around the common room, and you find her draped across the couch there, reruns of some old human cartoon flickering on the fuzzy television screen.

“Rose,” you call quietly, so she knows you’re approaching, and step around the couch to crouch between her and the television.

She frowns at you, face scrunching up and her eyebrows furrowing, but it comes off more comical than stern, a clear sign she’s had just a little too much to drink.

“Kananan...aya,” she mumbles, flapping an arm vaguely at you, and you sigh. She's further gone than you’d expected. It’s still early in the day, after all, and she tends to keep her drinking to later when she’s less likely to be caught.

“Hello, dear,” you say softly, and she smiles wonkily. “What are you watching?”

“Cartoons my mom used to show me,” she says. From a few conversations with her about her mother, you’ve gathered that she uses the alcohol not only to cope with her memories of her mother’s death, but as a way to feel closer to the woman. You wish you could free her from that hurt inside in the way she so desperately hopes the drinking will.

“I think you’ve had enough to drink,” you tell her, eyeing the almost empty bottle sitting on the floor by the sofa.

Surprisingly, she nods. “Maybe,” she slurs, “I just… wanted to stop thinking.”

“I know,” you tell her, “How about I get you some water? And something to eat?”

“No,” she mumbles, shaking her head, blonde hair tangling even further, “Gimme a while more.”

“Alright,” you say, knowing it’s not worth trying to push her, and you settle yourself more comfortably on your knees by her side. Your hand drifts to her face gently, without you even meaning to, but she doesn’t protest as you gently cup her face and run your thumb along her cheekbone. Her eyes flutter shut and she smiles faintly, and for a few moments you gently stroke her face and run your other hand through the tangles in her hair.

Then Rose shifts gently, and you know by now what to do. So you climb onto the couch with her as she moves to sit up further against one arm, and the two of you huddle close together. The smell of alcohol is stronger here, but you know she’s getting better, or at least she’s trying to. For you. She is trying for you, and that thought fills your heart with love.

“Kanaya I - Kan -” She mumbles.

“Ssh,” you hush, brushing a thumb under her eye and watching as her eyes shut again, long pale lashes batting against her skin. There will be time for the two of you to speak when she has rested. Later she will have to fight off the urge to drink more as the effects of the first lot begins to fade and the thoughts come back, and it is best she just sleep straight through that. She knows this too, and doesn’t hesitate to curl up closer against your side. Her hair tickles your cheek and one of her knees digs strangely into your stomach in a way you know will leave a bruise, but you don’t move a single muscle, for already she is falling asleep. You drape an arm around her shoulder and raise that hand to play with her hair gently, soothing her further until she can fall all the way into sleep.

She does, eventually, her head on your shoulder and your arm still around her, and you breathe out a faint sigh of relief for her. Then you close your own eyes gently and lean your head against hers. Underneath the smell of alcohol is the deep scent of her usual perfume and of the wool she constantly knits with, and the makeup that is still clinging to her face, and you breathe in the familiarity of it all. You hope one day that the alcohol smell will not be there at all, and you smile to yourself at this thought before you let out a tiny yawn.

There’s the sound of movement, just as you think you too might fall asleep, and you look up, ears twitching slightly to track the movement. For a second you see nothing, then you just about make out the shape of Dave skulking in the shadow of the doorway. His shades may be on, but you know his eyes are trained on you, so you twitch your head to gesture him over, and he does drift over reluctantly. Once he’s by your side he’s not so hesitant, though, and he sits himself down on your other side. He’s always so tense and stiff, so cautious, but you feel him soften as he leans against your side, and he reaches one hand to take a hold of Rose’s that rests on her knee.

“She’ll be okay,” you tell him.

“I know,” he huffs softly, and his head falls gently against your shoulder where he falls silent. You can practically hear him thinking, though, and you only hope he’ll soon fall asleep too so he can free himself from whatever’s plaguing him just for a few hours. He’s always so troubled, though you and Rose have only managed to pry a few meagre details about his childhood and his brother from him., but you know there must be so much more he hasn’t yet talked about. You wish, not for the first time, that you could go back in time and take a chainsaw to his brother.

You barely have time to dwell on Dave’s presence, though, before Karkat is suddenly appearing in the room, huddled up in his sweater and looking even smaller than usual. He seems to follow Dave more and more these days, and you’re happy they’re finding comfort in each other’s presence. 

“Hi,” he says quietly, his voice still as rough and scratchy as ever even at a lower volume, “Can I, uh-”

“Sure,” Dave grunts before you can even answer, though you nod to add to Dave’s reply.

Karkat smiles faintly and crawls up to curl up half on the couch and half on Dave’s lap, his head falling onto Dave’s knee. The hand of Dave’s that was holding Rose’s retracts to fall between Karkat’s horns instead and scratch gently at his scalp, and you hear Karkat let out a low purr. A happy trill of your own rolls in the back of your throat, and Dave grunts tiredly, rolling his chin on your shoulder until he’s more comfortable. Karkat’s purr evens out as he starts to drift off, Rose mumbles something in her sleep, and you smile softly to yourself.

The meteor may be dark and weird and everything you thought you hated about the world, but the people here are enough to make all of that so much better. You know when you wake up that Dave will have drooled against your shoulder, though he’ll claim it wasn’t him, and Rose will have a headache that leaves her weak and sad for most of the following day, and Karkat will go back to his routine of hating Dave’s presence when anyone else’s eyes are on them. But you also know that Terezi will have crept in at some point in the night, when no one was awake to see her, and she’ll be fast asleep on the floor in front of the couch, wrapped in her dragon cloak and leaning back to rest her head against Dave’s knees. Karkat will have Dave’s cloak draped over him, and you know Dave won’t hesitate to give it to him to help him sleep occasionally, and you know that Terezi will one day find a way to break free of Gamzee’s control, as you know that all of them will one day leave their problems behind and find the happier side of life.

Yes, this meteor is not the place you expected to be for three human years of your life. But right now you’re not sure if there’s anywhere else you’d rather be, or any other people you’d rather be with.

**Author's Note:**

> hiding from the chaotic mess that my life is by writing fanfics? of course.


End file.
